Memories
by lrhaboggle
Summary: When you die, if you get into Heaven, your memories are modified so that you are no longer compelled to sin. Or at least, that was the intention of the process. Sometimes, though, the memories still come back and everyone knows that having dangerous thoughts in Heaven can lead to a lot of problems...
1. The Voice In Her Head

Batez stretched her back contentedly. It was another great day in Heaven. She and her devoted partner had gotten to uphold the word by performing another wonderful translation! But while that was always good fun, she was currently doing another wonderful activity: relaxing. Being a Translator was hard work and Batez was always glad for her break. Currently, she was resting in her office on the couch and beside her was her best friend, partner and husband: Bentz. He was sitting on the other half of the couch, his arm around her shoulders and his eyes shut peacefully. She smiled warmly at him. Oh, this was Heaven!

Awhile into the relaxation, Batez heard the intercom over her head go off. God was announcing another performance if anybody wanted to go. Normally, the Translators would attend, but they decided to hang back tonight. Instead, Batez turned on their little TV to watch from the office couch. The songs and stories performed were as great as always, but Batez's interest kicked in upon seeing the applicant Cora Stein. Cora had been one of the girls Batez and Bentz translated a few days ago and she'd been with the one they just kicked out of Heaven last night. June Freeman.

Batez smirked dryly. Despite Cora's wondrous voice, Batez could hear the grief in it and knew the applicant was mourning her best friend. Batez shook her head. She knew Cora would mourn June, but it was a risky thing to do. Batez was even beginning to suspect Cora had uncouth feelings towards June. That is, Batez began to suspect Cora was lesbian. Batez shuddered at the word. Lesbians, gays. More like, abominations. They were unnatural, unlawful people and Batez hated them.

 _Why?_ Batez had to bite back a groan. The voice in her head was talking again. That annoying little thing! She knew what it was and she knew it would pass just like always, but it was still such a pest. The voice in her head was the voice of her old self, her living self, her human self, her sinful self. Whenever somebody died and went to Heaven, their memories were slightly suppressed so that they might live the holy life God wanted them to. By removing memories of a human life, God was removing memories of sin from his loyal flock. Of course, sometimes, the old memories returned to haunt their owners. The memories themselves weren't the sin. It was obeying the memories that was wrong. This was wrong because the memories always whispered sin into the ears of owners and the memories enticed the owners to go back to their evil, mortal ways. Batez and Bentz and every other denizen of Heaven had endured them, but like always, they just ignored the voices until they shut up then they carried on with life. Batez was willing to bet June had succumbed to her voices and that was why she stole the book which led to her being cast out. Batez told her own voices to shut up, but they did not.

 _Why are gays so bad? You can't tell the difference between themselves and everybody else. Is it just because somebody in charge said so?_ Batez winced. Today the voice in her head was friskier than normal. It was daring to challenge God. _The royal fraud? The man who claims to be merciful yet has no issue sending an innocent girl to Hell?_ Batez told the voice to shut up again. _What if it was Bentz? What if Bentz had to go to Hell? Would you let him? Would you be the one to send him?_ Batez shuddered now. This was a question she hated to think about, but it was true. If Bentz ever committed a translation, would Batez have to punish him? How would she bear it? How could she destroy her husband and laugh while doing it? _You know God is evil. Why do you serve him?_ Batez asked the voice to shut up again, this time with more politeness. It still didn't work. On and on it went, taunting Batez with the images of losing Bentz. Of seeing him tortured and dragged away from her forever. She began to cry.

"What's wrong Batez?" Bentz asked, hearing her whimpering. She was crying too hard to answer verbally. She tried to shake her head, but of course Bentz didn't believe her. "What's wrong?" he asked again and he didn't stop asking until she replied.

"I love you," she whimpered. That caught him off guard.

"I don't see why that would make you cry," he said. "But I love you too. Ya heard it?"

"I love you more than God," Batez clarified miserably, not even bothering to finish their old call-response. That woke Bentz up.

"What? You can't! It's illegal!" he protested.

"But it's true!" Batez replied with a cry. "I just can't stop thinking about June and how horrified Cora looked when we kicked her out. What if that was me and you?" Batez's dark words touched Bentz deep and his own inner voice began to mock and deride him until he was close to tears too. They clung desperately to each other for the next half hour in silence until the voices faded into the mist where they belonged.

"We'll be ok, we'll be ok," Bentz murmured over and over as the emotions passed. He still held Batez tightly. She nodded in reply, but her eyes were still wet. Slowly, the present-day returned and their inner voices had dimmed again. The whispers from their living selves had finally silenced again and they were free to go back to their sinless and heavenly lives.

"Thank goodness," Batez murmured, rubbing her head wearily. Never had the voices been so cruel and insistent. Bentz nodded in agreement. The images of Batez being hurt by him (directly or indirectly) were still seared in his mind and he vowed he'd protect her at all costs. He loved her too much to let her get hurt. She was thinking likewise.

The two were too disturbed to finish watching God's show. Instead, they shut off the TV and went to bed. Right before lights out, the two curled up closer than normal and Batez whispered one last thing.

"I love you… more than God," she tried to force a smile. "Ya heard it?" she knew it was a deadly thing to say, but it was true and perhaps her memories hadn't totally faded because there was still a hint of rebellion in her. She dared to admit that she loved Bentz more than God and, for once, she didn't feel bad about it. She looked anxiously to see how Bentz would react. His face seemed just as tired, troubled, and terrified as hers.

"I heard it," he replied and just for a moment, a grin lit face as a silent vow was made between the two and Batez felt a tiny smile grace her own face. Sleep came much easier after that even if nightmares riddle the corners.

 **AN: To re-explain, in this Heaven, if you've been accepted, your memories are modified so that you do know who you used to be, but some darker memories are suppressed just to remove the sinful thoughts from your mind. That way, you stay on the straight and narrow. Sometimes, though, the memories come back in the form of a voice, the voice you had while you were still alive. This voice that even God cannot remove plagues the angels of Heaven with the temptation to sin and it always asks why they're serving God in the first place. In this particular story, we see Batez's voice asking her why she follows God so blindly, especially because he pretty much has a gun to her head every day. She tries to ignore the voice and it does finally go away, but not before scaring her pretty badly.**


	2. Temptation

Emily was dying and her thoughts were not upon any past accomplishments (or lack thereof). Instead, they were upon what the future would hold. She claimed to be nonreligious, but a small part of her always believed in a God and his afterlife and now she was wondering if she would soon be proven right. She would never truly know though because, while God did take her to Heaven, he changed her. She was too rebellious and selfish to exist happily in his kingdom but she technically did still warrant a place in Heaven, so he fixed her. But something still seemed wrong. Although she'd been purified, she wasn't the same girl she used to be. It bothered God.

"She isn't Emily anymore," he muttered, looking at her clean, motionless body, which lay before him on his crafting table. "I suppose I should rename her. But what to call her?" he pondered for several moments before a name hit him. "I know! I'll call her June Freeman!"

June was proud and pleased to hear that she'd gotten an audition to join Heaven's Elite. Her training began well enough, but things went sour very quickly. June was a good person in general, but sometimes she lost control of herself and strange memories she didn't recall having would overtake her mind. It would be like she was being possessed by herself from another lifetime and she would do things that were very out of character for her now. For one example, she found herself getting incredibly flirty with both Agent and Cora Stein. Normally, June would've only looked upon either of them with platonic love but, for some reason, both of them kept reminding her of people she knew in that strange, past life and so, she indulged in her romantics lusts and she courted them both.

Another example would be her aversion to the Designer, the rules, and the banned books. For some reason, the Designer's constant, licentious remarks bothered her more than they bothered most of the other girls in Heaven. In fact, even during her first day in Heaven, June hadn't had the best of relationships with the flamboyant man. He kept on touching her and sliding his cape over her leg seductively and finally, she couldn't take it anymore. She pulled away from him and the moment she did so, a strange old anger flared up in her heart, like she was feeling a wrath she'd had back when she was still alive.

And as for the rules? Well, some of them just seemed to be begging to be broken! Cora would only look at her like she was a mad girl when she said this, but June really did feel some rebellious nature in her heart. She didn't understand why, but the compulsion to defy authority would not leave her alone. Then, as for the banned books, they were the worst of all. June knew that reading those books was illegal, but something about the idea of forbidden knowledge set her teeth on edge and she found herself drawn to what might be inside those books. It wasn't even just a case of curiosity killing the cat, though that was a big part of it. It was just that her anger at the idea of banned books seemed to be even deeper than a curiosity issue. It was almost like she had to know what was in the books or else someone would get hurt. It made no sense but these feelings and fears would not leave June no matter how hard she tried to fight them. At one point, the poor girl managed to get some pills prescribed to her that were specifically designed to help with these strange urges but every time she tried to take the pill, she would recoil as her past life would hiss at her. So the pills were of no use either.

Finally, though, June just stopped caring. The temptation and the voice in her head became too much and, allowing her past self to take over, she ran to the library with Agent chasing after her. She had stolen his keys and now she was going to steal one of those books! Unfortunately, the girl didn't get to read more than maybe a sentence or two before the sirens went off. Before June knew it, she was being beaten to death by the brutal police force. The Translators. As their truncheons cracked her head and beat her body and clobbered her limbs, June began to hallucinate. She heard screaming that didn't only belong to her. The Translators morphed into wicked men in long white coats. When Cora and the other applicants of Heaven came running in, June turned frantically to them and they too began to change into wild-looking girls who all wore long, striped stockings. Then, as June's limp, broken body was dragged to the elevator to Hell, June could've sworn the walls were striped even though earlier, they had been the same nondescript color as always. Then when she felt the elevator fall, she felt her skin start to burn.

When June woke up again, she was in Hell. The Devil had helped her recover from her fall and though she was still scarred (physically and mentally) she was adapting. She began to hate Heaven, blaming them all for her fate. But the one thing that stayed the same was her flashbacks. If anything, they were stronger and darker. In Heaven, her strange memories called to her in the form of impulsive decisions like chasing after Geraldine when the woman was rumored to have been made a favorite of God or stealing Agents keys in order to break into the banned book section of the library. Now she had hallucinations, auditory and visual. It was like her old self went from making suggestions to making orders and June, or Doll as she was now named, obeyed them. Since obeying such impulses was illegal in Heaven, she figured they were ok in Hell. There were no medicines prescribed to stifle the voices here, so she felt no shame or fear in them. Actually, they ended up shaping her demonic side…

When Doll first joined the Devil's Carnival, she was given a new outfit and job and she acquired a certain set of tastes and friends. They all came from hallucinations. She chose her outfit when she heard a voice whisper " _You know I like corsets and you know I like them tight."_ Her job came from a vision where she and many others (boys and girls alike) were kissing. She chose the Kissing Booth. As for tastes, Doll remembered the taste of something sweet but tart. Something hot. What was it? Tea. So although Doll enjoyed alcohol as it was a much more sinful drink, Doll still had a secret love of tea. She also ended up adopting a pet rat when, upon seeing said rat, she recalled her old self owning a rat named Sir Edward. A third taste came in the form of music. Doll had been roaming the carnival when she saw a forlorn violin in an empty tent. When she looked at it, she heard music in the distance that, while she'd never heard it before, seemed familiar to her. She picked up the wood instrument and was able to replicate the music in one go. She'd laid claim to the violin ever since. These strange memories began to shape Doll.

As for friends, Doll's closets were two of the three woe-maidens and a man named Scorpion. The woe-maidens reminded her of people she knew in life and Scorpion reminded her of a distant lover. Had she been wed to this lover? She couldn't recall. So instead, she replicated as much as she could pull from her memories and thus, she grew closer to those three than anybody else in Hell. She was trying to recreate the life she had but couldn't remember by using memory fragments of that life to build her carnie image.

More time passed and Doll was still pondering her past existence and the memories still came at uncontrollable times. The last one she had was the strongest yet and lasted a whole minute. It began when Doll was doing her hair. She looked into the mirror to see a woman without scars riddling her face and Doll somehow knew this was the old version of her. Doll quickly set about memorizing every detail so that even after the hallucination faded back into her real face, she would be able to recreate the image. She was currently sitting in her Kissing Booth, busily drawing what she could recall from her memories. She hoped someday she'd have the full picture and story of her past…

"Doll? What are you doing?" it was the Devil. She showed him the drawing. "Oh, my dear Doll. Don't you know it does no good to dwell on that kind of past? That is a time long ago and there is no way to return to it!" he cried. Then before she could even give him a confused look, he began to wave his claws and chant something in his deep, rich voice. Doll felt sleepier and sleepier…

When Doll woke, she was still at her Kissing Booth. Had she fallen asleep on the job? She didn't know. But that never happened before! Why couldn't she remember anything? She was holding a pencil. But why? Doll shook her head, annoyed at herself. But before she could even consider what had happened, though, she saw a middle-aged man stumble miserably towards her, his brown trench coat and hat matching his dark demeanor. Doll grinned wickedly as she set her mind on a new task. It was show time.

 **AN: This was an AU wherein June/Doll used to be Emily from Emilie Autumn's asylum book. This followed the same premises as the Batez story where people who end up in Heaven have some of their memories modified to control their sinful nature. Unlike Batez, though, June succumbs to those voices and those past memories and ultimately, it leads to her fall. In Hell, as she finds out, the memories aren't very welcomed either and the story ends with her losing most of those memories again just as John shows up to the Kissing Booth. Beforehand, though, the story just showed how and why Doll chose the life that she did and yes, this also acted as a comparative fic of Emilie and Doll.**

 **(Every inspiration Doll uses comes from Emily in some way. The corsets, the tea, the rats, the two woe-maidens, Scorpion, Agent and Cora. The line about the corsets actually came from the livestream Emilie did, the two woe-maidens were Contessa and Maggots, Scorpion was Dr. Grimsby from the music video for FLAG, and Agent and Cora were Thompson and Annie).**


End file.
